Another Wild Wacky Week
Equities start the day unchanged as another wild wacky week kicks off. Welcome to the wild world of Monday where I attempt to use the letter W as much as possible. After digesting Friday’s move over the weekend I guess I can understand why everyone got so spooked. Change is never easy, and it’s especially difficult when the change means tighter monetary policy. We’re all used to whizzing around a world filled with low interest rates and washboard abs so when someone tells us that rates will be going higher, its stock market whoopin’ time. It was a fairly quiet morning as people sat down to their Wheaties and Waffles and I have to imagine that the Fed meeting next Wednesday will suck a bit of energy from daily price action. One thing I’m sure we’re all thankful for is a change in the Weather (not the time though, that sucked). It was a whopping 44 degrees in my hometown over the weekend and it felt like a Blue Whale was lifted from our hearts. 44 in March? Get out the grille, it’s time for Whiskey and Wagyu steaks! (seriously, what else could I have gone with there?) Ok, let’s see if anything happened in the market today because this gimmick has gotten woefully weak.
After the open, we entered a very quiet market in which everyone looked forward to the Apple event. I’m not kidding you when I say that either, there was no economic data and no mega deals to talk about (I guess Alcoa did buy RTI) so most people focused on one company to rule them all. Around noon my entire timeline was devoted to talking about a gold computer and a fancy new watch. I mean even journalists who talk about EPA issues in Texarkana were fascinated by a piece of electronics. I guess that’s life in 2015 right? Teenagers who stare and phones and adults who swoon over 802.11bc wifi on their new internet surfing machine. During the presentation stocks began to move higher as the focus left Fed action and went back to “wait, why did I sell on Friday again? We already knew they were going to raise rates right?” Winners: MAC, STZ, ATI, SEE, ENDP, and COL. Losers: AA, DO, NE, CHK, SWN, and RIG. Fun times in energy right? Winners one day, losers the next. Really nothing in the middle there. By lunch we sat on 2,080, up 0.4% in a snore fest. You know what’s crazy about this video…the guy almost made it across. Work on that 40 time pal!
The final hour brought absolutely zero, in fact the S&P traded in a 4 pt range from lunch to the bell. Nothing to report on today my friends, no real action and nothing important to make fun of. So let’s see what tomorrow brings because this one was a non-event!
Final Score: Dow +78bps, S&P500 +39bps, Nasdaq +31bps, Rus2k +50bps.
News Highlights:
- Succinct Summation of the Days’ Events: honestly I would leave this blank if I could. Apple presentation was everything. Without that it was completely quiet and uneventful.
- Fascinating chart on the S&P now and in 2009. Wanna know what stands out the most? Average notional price of a stock. Says a lot about a lot of things.
- How much do you need to make to buy a home in your city? If it’s San Fran, it’s a stupid amount.
- More Seth Klarman! Go read the article in which the GEM of a quote came from: Perhaps Klarman’s own statement captures the situation best when he dryly describes the fund’s outlook: “In short, we are neither bullish nor bearish. We are value-ish.” I love it! Im gonna use that from now on!
- The NYT must be levered long! They are writing to Janet directly telling her to “hold off on that rate hike thing”. Actually maybe they are all re-fi’ing homes?
- A new Game of Thrones trailer? This might be the most important thing today.
- A Ray Dalio article in the same recap as Klarman? Legends right here in this recap my friends.
- I’ve actually walked thru this city and it really is that nice.
- 4th longest bull market on record. Is that worrisome? I don’t know, maybe. But it’s only half of the longest…
- Ever seen an underwater waterfall? Now you have. If you are a diver…is that heaven?
- Yes, I’m dumping my “use these for the recap” file. This has to be Cali right?
We’ll end tonight with something near and dear to me. Skiing. I love it, my kids love it, you should take it up next winter. However, anytime I’m on the lifts with my son I always think about this. Would you be able to get down?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ni0jYZOCk6Q#t=0m23s
Have a good night.